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16
LILĀVAI
to infer that the recension of B, if at all it is indebted to J, is indebted only through P. Further p is not only confined to J alone, but has assidiously consulted some more MSS. and noted additional verses (see the Notes and remarks on 635: 1 etc.)
No categorical judgement can be hurriedly pronounced about all these so-called additional verses, because the problem is somewhat complicated : the MS, material at our disposal is quite limited; the number of MSS. is too small to enable us to establish clear-cut genealogical relationship among them; and the narration of the story is sufficiently loose to admit some verses here and there. Thus the documentary evidence is insufficient and any judgement about the consistency, propriety, necessity, etc. of a verse can be easily disputed. We have to await, therefore, the discovery of some more Mss., and then every verse or group of verses will have to be judged on its own merits without any bias against one MS. or the other.
The last verse of our text is a very late addition in Ms. P: it is added on the lower margin of the palm-leaf in a different hand, and apparently the motive is to invest the work with some sanctity. The rest of the concluding portion of the poem has come down to us in two recensions (JP ending thus : 1316, 1317-19, 1320 and 1321-33; and B ending thus : 1316, 1319, 1, and 1320,1-2) which are independent and selfsufficient, if judged by themselves. They are incompatible and in portions superfluous, if put together as in this edition. So we find that these two recensions cannot be derived from one and the same archetype. As against the readings commonly found in J and P, the variants of B betray a revisionist's hand, and in a few cases perhaps that of the commentator himself. But this should not prejudice us against the authenticity of the Shorter Recension of B, so far as the number of verses and the concluding form are concerned. We can understand the commentator's, or some of his predecessor's, motive in his improvement on the lectio difficilior, say, an archaism, a metrical defect, a Deśi word, or a popular (-Apabhramsa) idiom; but for changing the conclusion and for omitting a pretty large number of gāthās no apparent motive is there. The commentator very well explains the concluding verse of his recension; he finds nothing lacking to complete the story; and gāthās Nos. 1316 and 1320 stand more suitably in the Shorter Recension, My hypothesis is that perhaps the author himself first wrote the shorter Recension lying at the basis of B;
1
This I state with some reservation, and I am open to correction.
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